When Toshiba first entered the tablet space, they specifically told us “we’re not focusing on thin and light, we’re focusing on usability.” This was true — both the Thrive and Thrive 7″ have a host of ports and the big guy even has a removable battery.

But it would seem that Toshiba is ready to switch up the strategy, as the company is today announcing the world’s thinnest and lightest 10-inch tablet, the Excite 10 LE.

Not sure where the whole “LE” thing came from so let’s just ignore that. The Excite 10 has a brushed magnesium alloy back panel and only weighs 1.18lbs with a waistline of 7.7mm. For some perspective, the Droid Razr is 7.1mm thick.

The slate runs Android 3.2 Honeycomb, but Toshiba and I talked tirelessly about this and you can rest assured the Excite will run Ice Cream Sandwich by the end of spring. Past that, you’ll have a 1280×800 10.1-inch AutoBrite display, along with a OMAP 4430 1.2GHz dual-core processor.

Portage seems to be Toshiba’s specialty, and even as such a thin slate, the Excite 10 still makes room for the necessary connectivity. MicroUSB, HDMI, and microSD slots are all included, along with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth support. On the back you’ll find a 5-megapixel camera capable of video capture in 1080p, along with a 2-megapixel front-facing shooter for video chat.

The Excite 10 LE comes in both 16- and 32GB flavors for $529 and $599 respectively.